Deer Strike!

Last Saturday Lois and I went in to visit Kim and S'kha, taking our Zimbabwean friend, Mike, along. Mike had taught Kim over 20 years ago. now Kim is professor of African history with a double PhD. Mike still lives in Zimbabwe, dealing with power cuts and a lack of running water. He came over for his son's college graduation, giving us a chance to visit in the city and renew old friendships.

We had a good evening, and headed home as the sun set. North of the 49th parallel, on a Spring evening (or in what passes for Spring in Manitoba) that means driving around 9:30, so that we approached our home town after dark.

Two or three miles north of home Lois suddenly yelled, "Stop!" Now she has called out surprising things sometimes, such as the other morning when she told me to get something from the car outside. Turned out she was still asleep and the request was part of her dream. Not this request, however. I hit the brakes, and a deer passed lightly in front of us. I thought we had dodged the danger, but then we saw a second deer and felt a significant thump. The sound of the impact was enough by itself to shake us all up.

I kept going. After 10, so close to home, one dead deer (I thought): why stop? At home we checked the damage, which was remarkably slight. The passenger side mirror was gone, and there was some slight scoring of the passenger side doors. The repairs come to $1,200; but the damage was less than I could have expected based on the sight and sound of the unfortunate deer.

We're glad to be home and grateful for so little harm. I hope that the deer just bounced, and went on his way a bit startled. But I'm afraid: a snapped neck seems more likely.

Driving Again

I should take pictures like my sister does, then illustrating narratives would be so much easier! But I am not the photographer in our family; and Lois was sick on Sunday. So I drove down to Minnesota alone.

There was a lot of water out. The Red River is filling up with water, and the Red River valley is on full flood alert. When I candidated at Providence in 1997, the crest of that year's flood was moving through Winnipeg: The Flood of the Century. Now people are talking about a repeat. It doesn't look quite as bad here in Manitoba; but in Minnesota and North Dakota the danger is real.

I saw fields full of water, fields that needed a skiff more than a tractor. They aren't as bad yet as they might become, but they're bad enough. I was preaching at a Covenant church in a small northern Minnesota town -- mostly farmer families. Not everyone was there: at least one family was sandbagging their yard to keep the place safe from rising water.

Meanwhile we wait. Tonight we're supposed to get two or three inches of rain (or its equivalent in snow). That's the fear -- that a major storm will add to the frozen or waterlogged ground and run off into the Red. Then ice jams downriver closer to Lake Winnipeg can add to the problem.

The Red flows north, an unusual thought for most Americans. usually it is a placid, mild stream. Now we're watching it grow and praying that it doesn't get too high.